Shadowbound

Shadowbound: Episode 3

I have chosen to remember the events of last night differently.

In it, I did not scream.

A monster did not cross the fire to reach me.

And I did not, for the space of a single breath, feel safe by your side.

This way is correct, orderly. I have gone over it enough times since dawnbreak that I almost believe it.

You are awake when I rise, of course. You have not moved from your side of the dead kindle, wrists bound still in iron and you are watching the light come grey over the pines. So intently, as though you are waiting on something I cannot foresee.

Vivianne: We leave within the hour.

Damion: Good morning to you too.

Vivianne: It is no morning for pleasantries.

Damion: No. You do not strike me as a woman who has many pleasant words to spare.

Vivianne: You did not sleep?

Damion: I told you so already, I rarely do. Besides, Seer, it is difficult to rest beside someone so inclined to cause an uproar in their sleep.

Vivianne: You sat there all night. Watching me?

Damion: Someone had to be sure you did not choke in your sleep.

Vivianne: I do not require a monster to watch me breathe.

Damion: And yet, Seer, here you are, with breath enough to waste on complaint. I would say I have done an excellent job, would you not?

I find I have no words to retaliate, so I busy my hands with the girth strap, dismissing you in favour of preparing the horse for travel.

It is a strange thing, to have spent an entire life being watched. In court, you are raised to be looked at. The divine sight watches, always, from behind my own eyes. I am well-used to being the strange thing in the room that is scrutinised.

I, however, am not used to doing the looking.

But I catch myself doing so through the morning, over and over. You tack up the mare with the unhurried gait of a man who has never seen need to rush, which is an insult from one bound in shackles. The way your eyes glide over the tree line and the ridge and the road behind us, marking them, calling them to memory, before they ever return to me. There is a scar too, flashing pale and ghastly at your collarbone when your shirt shifts. And under all of it, faint but constant, that scent I cannot place. It lies somewhere between rain-drenched winter pine and sun-baked leather, impossible and ever-changing. It met me in your cell and has not left since.

I tell myself I watch you because a wise woman keeps her eyes on her weapon.

But my cheeks are hot despite the frigid air, and I find I am struggling to find a defence for that too.

Damion: You have been watching me closely since we broke camp, Seer.

Vivianne: I watch anything that is capable of putting a knife in my back.

Damion: Mm. Is that all it is?

Vivianne: What else would it be?

Damion: If you have a question, you need only ask it.

Vivianne: Walk further ahead of me.

Damion: As you wish. Though it will not stop you looking.

By the second hour, my mark has climbed past my elbow. I feel its crawl, a slow hot drag beneath the skin, the burn of it setting my stomach on edge. My fingers have gone numb, clumsy on the reins.

Damion: You look pale.

Vivianne: It is called exhaustion. It is hardly a mystery.

Damion: It is more than that. This 'affliction' of yours is taking more from you than you are letting on.

Vivianne: You are no physician.

Damion: Perhaps not, but I would know of this better than any physician alive.

Vivianne: Then tell me what it is.

Damion: You would not thank me for it.

Vivianne: I am not in the habit of thanking prisoners anyhow. Say it.

Damion: It is not a rot, or whatever the priests have named it. It is not eating you, it is changing you. There is a difference.

Vivianne: Changing me? Into what?

Damion: You are not ready for the answer.

There it is again. That certainty. You say things like that, 'better than any alive', as though you hold some sort of claim on what is happening to me. It should enrage me. Most of what you say enrages me.

Where there should be fury, instead I find I long to believe you, and that frightens me more than the mark does.

Damion: Seer?

The world turns on its side.

It is not a full vision, only the edge of one, a lurch and a smear of grey at the sides of my sight. But my knee gives against the saddle and the ground swings up to meet me. Then your hand is at my elbow, irons and all, steadying me in my seat.

Vivianne: Let go of me–!

Damion: –When you can sit up on your own, gladly.

I have the training. I could break your fingers for your insubordination.

But I do not.

Rather, I count to twenty in my own head, and by twenty the road is clear once more.

You release me, slowly, as though you are afraid I might shatter into pieces.

It is a mercy, I find, when neither of us speaks another word.

The afternoon sun had already begun its descent when we hear three riders approach at a hard pace from behind us. We had finally come upon where the road narrows between two shoulders of rock. I recognise the livery before their faces. The crown's grey and gold, the star at the breast. I breathe my first sigh of relief since our departure. These are the King's men.

Rider: Seer. Hold, in the name of the crown.

Vivianne: I sent no word for a second escort?

Rider: The order came after you left. We are to see you the rest of the way.

Vivianne: By whose orders? Name them.

Rider: The Lord Chancellor's, Seer. Sealed and signed this very morning.

It is the right answer. It is the exact answer a King's man would give. So I do not understand, at first, why you have gone so still beside me.

Vivianne: This morning? You must have ridden at a considerable pace to reach us.

Rider: Indeed, my lady.

Damion: Vivianne–

Vivianne: Quiet.